The Federal High Court in Abuja has commenced a trial-within-trial to determine if a former Minister of Power, Saleh Mamman’s written statement allegedly confessing to corruption charges was made from his free will.
The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) was said to have obtained the statement from him preparatory to filing the corruption charges against him last year.
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EFCC’s first witness in the trial-within-trial, a sideshow to the main N33.8 billion fraud trial, testified, insisting that Mr Mamman gave the statement voluntarily. This is according to a statement from the anti-graft agency’s spokesperson, Dele Oyewale, shared with PREMIUM TIMES on Tuesday.
Abubakar Kwaido, an investigator with the EFCC, said Mr Mamman authorised his lawyer, Mohammed Ahmed of Pineal Solicitors, to write the statement on his behalf due to his ill health at the time.
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Led in evidence by prosecution counsel Rotimi Oyedepo, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), Mr Kwaido said the statement in question was taken on 20 February 2024 and recorded in a general office equipped with audiovisual surveillance, accessible to multiple parties.
He quoted Mamman’s signed authorisation form: “I, Saleh Mamman, have authorised my lawyer, Mohammed Ahmed of Pineal Solicitors, to write on my behalf due to ill health and other health challenges. In support of this, I have submitted a medical report to that effect.”
Mr Mamman is standing trial on 12 counts of conspiracy and money laundering involving N33.8 billion meant for the Mambilla Power Project.
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Why trial-within-trial?
On 19 March, trial judge James Omotosho paused the main trial to conduct a trial-within-trial following the defence team’s objection to EFCC’s move to tender a written confessional statement credited to the former minister as an exhibit.
The prosecution was to tender the confessional statement dated 20 February 2024 through EFCC’s 17th prosecution witness when defence lawyer Femi Atte, a SAN, raised an objection to its admissibility.
The specific confession contained in the statement has yet to be discussed during proceedings.
However, the defence lawyer alleged that his client made the statement involuntarily at EFCC’s office.
In response, the judge said the issue of involuntariness of a statement and other grounds of objections raised by the defence counsel could only be resolved by conducting a trial-within-trial to ascertain their veracity.
‘Statement was voluntary’
Opening the trial-within-trial with his testimony, Mr Kwaido, an investigator with the EFCC, refuted the claim by the defence that the statement attributed to the defendant was a product of threats and not voluntary.
Mr Kwaido said the process was audio-visually recorded.
He said the office where the statement was taken was a general office where different parties came in and went out.
He added that Mr Mamman, due to his ill health, opted to dictate his statement whiel his lawyer wrote down it down.
Mr Kwaido also chronicled the events leading up to the recording of the statement.
He said, “The defendant was supposed to report back to our office two weeks after the initial interrogation, but he absconded for about six months.
“We were calling and sending him messages to report to our office for further statements and he wrote to us through his lawyers for a reprieve of few days to report, suggesting 14 and 20 February 2024 and he chose to come on the 20 and when he came, we interviewed him and his lawyer was smiling all through and nobody threatened him.”
Continuing, the witness said he was surprised to hear that the former minister was threatened. “We have been communicating with him, he mentioned his business partners which we asked him to contact them and there are other documents we asked him to come with but he said we should give him two weeks and he did not come back.”
The audio-visual recording of the confessional statements was taken in court through the screen.
The judge then adjourned the case until 10 April for continuation of trial-within-trial.
Main trial so far
The EFCC alleged in the charges that over N26 billion earmarked for the Mambilla Power Project was diverted through Bureau de Change operators under his instruction.
In his testimony during the main trial, Mr Kwaido had traced multiple transactions through over 10 corporate accounts linked to operators such as Breathable Investment, Fullest Utility Concepts, and Golden Bond Nigeria Ltd.
READ ALSO: Empowerment schemes are cover-up for governance failure in Nigeria — Ex-Minister
He told the court that the EFCC received intelligence in 2023 suggesting massive financial diversions. Investigations were carried out in collaboration with commercial banks, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), and the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC).
“All the statements made by the defendant were taken in the presence of his lawyer on 20 February, 10, 11, 12, 15, 17 May, and 3 and 9 August 2024,” Mr Kwaido said.
The defence, however, contested the admissibility of the statement made on 20 February, insisting it was not voluntarily given.
Earlier, the 15th prosecution witness, Okoafor Nnenna, a deputy manager in the Domestic Payments unit of the CBN, told the court that her unit responded to the EFCC’s request with official documentation of the Ministry of Power’s transactions.
Similarly, the 16th witness, Veronica Sampam, a First Bank compliance officer, confirmed the bank received a letter from the EFCC in October 2024 requesting details on the account of one Idris Musbahu, which they supplied.
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